Out of the park (4.00 / 1)

Nice post, Natasha. I guess maybe we should look to the sporting press to cover the banks since they're better qualified to do it than the regular news media & punditocracy.

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by: careerdoctor @ Fri Mar 12, 2010 at 19:03:28 PM CST

comedians seem to do a pretty good job :) (0.00 / 0)

sports journalists are probably better with numbers though :)

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by: dr anonymous @ Sat Mar 13, 2010 at 09:45:05 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Olbermann was a sports journalist for many years (0.00 / 0)

Charles Pierce is good on politics too. It's just the political columnists and reporters, and the news announcers who are mostly morons.

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by: John Emerson @ Sat Mar 13, 2010 at 10:01:00 AM CST

[ Parent ]

good point (4.00 / 1)

i do think though sports culture (particularly football, but others as well) can often be very conservative and the reporters have a role in this.  The gender politics in particular are atrocious, but also on race, by accepting the legitimacy of 'owners' to make enormous profits but complainign about player salaries (again, this has decreased a bit).  It's getting a bit better and there are rare exceptions (e.g. rick reilly had a great obit/article about a transgender sports journalism figure recently and michael lewis can be excellent), but i still think it's suspect.

i guess you can apply the same criticisms to comedy - but i think jon stewart does a better job than olberman :) comedy is a bit more anti-hegemonic in nature, for better and worse, i think.

also, on an aside, on my list of 'things we'll never get to and probably wouldn't be appropriate but allow me to vent' is a constitutional amendment banning former football players for running for office :D  was reminded again of this with Heath Shuler's position on health care - but the list goes on and on - kemp, largent, etc.

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by: dr anonymous @ Sat Mar 13, 2010 at 10:57:27 AM CST

[ Parent ]

EVEN sports writers are better than op-ed writers. (4.00 / 2)

That was my point. Back in 2003 or so, the Dixie Chicks (of all people) were among the few willing to speak up. We've seen a disastrous collapse of the political media, though "collapse" is the wrong word. It's more like a conquest and occupation.

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by: John Emerson @ Sat Mar 13, 2010 at 11:38:20 AM CST

[ Parent ]

One sign (4.00 / 1)

One sign that the economy is truly bad is that for the first time since free agency came into being baseball actively cut salaries over the winter.  Yes, those Steinbrenner kids cut the Yankees payroll below $200 million.  That included ditching World Series MVP (and the team's best clutch player) Hideki Matsui who took a 50% pay cut to sign with the Angels (Matsui entered the Series as the only Yankee with higher career marks in batting average, on base percentage and slugging percentage in the post season vs. the regular season, a rare feat).

Some of the moves seemed baffling to me.  The Braves, for example, resigned Tim Hudson (2-1 while coming off an injury) but dumped Javier Vasquez a 15 game winner IIRC.  Vasquez would have made $11.5 million and the $2 million was the decider.  Huh?  The extra money was used to pay for Melky Cabrera who the Yankees thought might make $6 million in 2 years due to arbitration.  In two years, Hal?  Personally, Melky hits below average for an outfielder and I never thought he deserved 500 at bata from the Yankees but ...

The Mariners made a serious effort to revamp their team and possibly sneak in to the playoffs or at least get much better.  Only they refused to resign a firt base man who had (surprisingly) hit 31 homers last year.  Seemed obvious but they are going with a kid.

The poorer teams don't even seem to make much effort beyond signing a few borderline retreads.  The Dodgers, always big spenders, seemed to be held back by the divorce of their owners.  Nobody came up with $4 million per year for Chien Ming Wang who is an injury removed from being one of the most consistent winners in baseball.  In years past, Wang would have gotten a three or four year deal loaded with incentives rather than being exiled to the Nationals.

Yes, the Phillies did the switch of the aces but after coming so close they certainly did not keep both.

Would baseball pursur two wars we can't afford?  The Phillies say no.  Maybe we ought to listen to these guys more often.  

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by: David Kowalski @ Sun Mar 14, 2010 at 01:43:28 AM CST

[ Parent ]

baseball would however build a system where only about 8 or 9 teams can compete on a regular basis (0.00 / 0)

to me what is more obnoxious is that they have an owner - and imo a relatively dumb one at that - as commissioner.  how is that at all reasonable or fair? :(

have you read about the new 'plan' to restore competitiveness?  they're considering allowing teams to switch divisions frequently and of their own accord to mitigate the 'is competing, is not competing' part of it.  reminds me of the premier league.

in any case, god forbid they simply cap salary as a percentage of revenues and have revenue sharing among teams as well ;)  what's the point of an anti-trust exemption if you won't use it for good or usefully?

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by: dr anonymous @ Sun Mar 14, 2010 at 08:56:45 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Pete Rose is Scum (0.00 / 0)

Suppose I am a baseball manager who has bet an even $100k per game on my own team. Do I leave a pitcher in even if I know it risks this game but by not drawing on the shoulder of my middle reliever makes it more likely to make my bets on the next two games pay off?

Billy Martin won a World Series for the Oakland Athletics by overworking his starting pitching in a way that arguably shortened their careers. But both they and Billy walked away with Championship rings. Which after was the point.  But if his policy of pitcher substitution or not have been driven by considerations of winning the bet on that particular day our judgment would be different.

That all your bets are on the same side does not mean you are innocent of weighting the scales. Everytime Rose left a struggling pitcher in on the bet that saving that middle reliever or closer fresh for the next day or week    was a moral crime.

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by: Bruce Webb @ Fri Mar 12, 2010 at 19:39:11 PM CST

are you sure (4.00 / 1)

I don't think Martin won a World Series with the A's.  

ps. The steroid disaster rather suggests that we shouldn't hold up baseball or the baseball media as wonderful, but of course that's not really Natasha's point.

New Jersey politics at Blue Jersey.

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by: Hopeful in NJ @ Fri Mar 12, 2010 at 20:01:40 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Dick Williams & Tony LaRussa ... (4.00 / 1)

were the only A's managers to win WS titles ... Martin .. when he was manager of the A's just took a really crappy team and got them near(1980) and in(1981) the playoffs .. but you are right about his overworking the starting pitchers

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by: Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle @ Fri Mar 12, 2010 at 20:54:57 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Rotation (0.00 / 0)

Some of Rose's substitutions seemed inexplicable apart from the betting.  He clearly played inferior players way too much.  The reason until the scandal was assumed to be that he played people he liked even though they couldn't hit any more.  I always thought he used his best lineups only for the games he bet on meaning that he played to win far less than 100% of the time.  Or that he played to win the bets, and only the bets.

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by: David Kowalski @ Sun Mar 14, 2010 at 01:48:19 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Natasha, I love you completely will you marry me! (4.00 / 2)

signed dick fuld

But seriously can we book you on all the sunday talk shows, charlie rose and bill moyers, please god!

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by: martinlomasney @ Fri Mar 12, 2010 at 21:41:08 PM CST

Exactly, Natasha. CDS is nothing less than a short sale... (4.00 / 1)

Leveraged into the stratosphere, $100 Trillion of CDS is nearly twice the world's GDP. The nonsense we see is musical chairs among well-known players...a three card monty scam using the President of the United States as a lookout. God's work?  

They only call it class war when we fight back.

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by: ezdidit @ Sat Mar 13, 2010 at 00:53:12 AM CST

Also interesting in this context: The "uptick rule" (0.00 / 0)

The uptick rule generally prohibits short selling of securities except on an uptick. The rule was defined by U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) which summarized it: "Rule 10a-1(a)(1)  provided that, subject to certain exceptions, a listed security may be sold short (A) at a price above the price at which the immediately preceding sale was effected (plus tick), or (B) at the last sale price if it is higher than the last different price (zero-plus tick). Short sales were not permitted on minus ticks or zero-minus ticks, subject to narrow exceptions."[
....
In 1938, the [U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission] (SEC) adopted the uptick rule, more formally known as rule 10a-1, after conducting an inquiry into the effects of concentrated short selling during the market break of 1937.[4]  The original rule was implemented when Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr. was SEC commissioner.
...
"In 2004, the Commission initiated a year-long pilot that eliminated short sale price test restrictions from approximately one-third of the largest stocks. The purpose of the pilot was to study how the removal of such short sale price test restrictions impacted the market for those subject securities.

Short sale data was made publicly available during this pilot to allow the public and Commission staff to study the effects of eliminating short sale price test restrictions. Third-party researchers analyzed the publicly available data and presented their findings in a public Roundtable discussion in September 2006. The Commission staff also studied the pilot data extensively and made its findings available in draft form in September 2006, and final form in February 2007.
...
On July 3, 2008 Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen &  Katz, an adviser on mergers and acquisitions, said short-selling was at record levels and asked the SEC to take urgent action and reinstate the 70-year-old uptick rule.[13]  On November 20, 2008, they renewed their call stating "Decisive action cannot await ... a new S.E.C. Chairman. ... There is no tomorrow. The failure to reinstate the Uptick Rule is not acceptable."
...
On March 10, 2009, the SEC and Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA), Chairman of the Financial Services Committee announced plans to restore the uptick rule. Frank said he was hopeful that it would be restored within a month.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U...

Wow, that's impressive, isn't it? The SEC got rid of a rule preventing short selling, just in time to allow speculators to make huge profits by betting on the fall of big banks! That was farsighted deregulation only slightly less impressive than the perfect eyesight of Marily Monroe in "How to marry a millionaire"...

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by: Gray @ Sat Mar 13, 2010 at 01:25:38 AM CST

Re: Colorable Claims: Why Is Banking Less Accountable Than Baseball? (0.00 / 0)

You know what, instead of gambling why don't we use our money into a more important things. The last decade, from 2000 to 2009, was kind of a lost decade of economic growth - real GDP growth, or Gross Domestic Product, was hovering under 2% for the Noughties, as they are called. Nowadays, finding a job is not that easy that's why we need to use our money wisely. It is just so sad that there are some people who use their money to not so important things.

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by: Jinky @ Sat Mar 13, 2010 at 02:42:47 AM CST

I've generalized the rule (4.00 / 2)

Here is the same rule with regard to journalism. Excerpt:

The lesson is that the Times is willing to publish good reporting as long as the topic written about does not have critical day-to-day, life-and-death importance for our lives. So for topics the Sulzbergers regard as peripheral and fluffy, we get good stuff. But when the chips are down and the rubber hits the road, on war and peace or unemployment and depression, other considerations intervene, and the Times becomes the propaganda organ of an unexpressed neo-con, neoliberal non-partisan "centrist" agenda.

This rule can be generalized:

When the chips are down and the rubber hits the road -- when it comes to war and peace, or unemployment and depression -- for the people who count, the neo-con, neoliberal, non-partisan "centrist" agenda trumps everything else.

I've been extremely discouraged lately when I think about the power of the neo-cons and neoliberals in the Democratic Party, their domination of the media, the considerable inroads they've made in public opinion, and the fact that the criminal Bush disasters don't seem to have changed very many people's minds. Seemingly about 5% of the electorate switched from the Republicans to the Democrats for one election, and that's about it.

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by: John Emerson @ Sat Mar 13, 2010 at 07:34:58 AM CST

Look at it (0.00 / 0)

Look at the actual hard copy paper edition of the NY Times.  It is loaded with non-news news.  Things that are either vaguely interesting colorful bits about movies, small towns way out os state, or have been known days, weeks, or months earlier to anybody who reads the blogs and a few other newspapers on line.

They don't cover New Jersey or Connecticut except to provide a few sneering articles and some travel type articles about local towns.  The same thing they do occassionally about Omaha or Pittsburg.  Their coverage of City government and happenings is way behind that of the Daily News (hours behind on big news stories).  It's pathetic.

The paper is now written for the Village, Wall Street investors, and people who are out of touch but think they are on the cutting edge.  They even acknowledged that advertiser interest decided how much of the news hole went to different subjects.  Advertisers preferred coverage of the stock market while readers preferred local and national news and sports.  The advertisers won.

Maybe the Times never was as good as its reputation but it has been on a long slide covered up by bs opinion (Maureen Dowd, that's you) and more bs opinion (Thomas Friedman).

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by: David Kowalski @ Sun Mar 14, 2010 at 03:06:25 AM CDT

[ Parent ]